නත්තල් දා ජේසු - A Christmas Song

 නත්තල් දා  ජේසු - A Christmas Song

Sung By Sajiptha Samaraweera & Pavithra Sewwandi

Lyrics and Melody by Fr. Rashmi M. Fernando, SJ

Music, Digital Mixing, & Mastering by Amila Dilhan (A3 Life Recording Studio)

Visuals by Hasun Mangala

A Precious Bud Nipped Before It Is Fully Bloomed

A Precious Bud Nipped Before It Is Fully Bloomed

 The journey that we walked together for the past 14 years doesn’t seem to have been far away. I remember, sitting on the floor of the Noviciate Chapel, making that life-revealing meditation, ‘Meditation on Death’. It helped us that day to imagine the types of people, their strata, and what they would say and do at our own funerals. Terrifying as it would seem, it indeed helped us that day to change our vision about life. But! But! But! Who on earth did think that day that the meditation would become so real to us so soon. Just 10 months into the Priesthood, the ‘Madampe Punchi Swami’ as the parishioners affectionately addressed him, Rev. Fr. Nilan Prasanga Fernando, S.J., was taken abruptly to the Lord on the 12^th of July 2018 when he was only 35 years of age. 

Born to Mr. Antony Kingsley Fernando and Mrs.Maklet Tecla Fernando on 31^st May 1983 in Negombo, Rev. Fr. Nilan Prasanga Fernando, S.J. is the second of three children – two brothers and a sister. As a child, he grew up around Our Lady of the Holy Rosary Church, Kudapaduwa, a sub-station of St. Sebastian parish, Sea Street, Negombo. Having started his initial education at Loyola College, Negombo (1^st Grade), he eventually joined St. Mary’s College, Negombo where he completed his G.C.E. O/L and A/L examinations.

In the year 2005, he entered ‘Daham Sihila’, the Novitiate of the Society of Jesus at Dalugama, Kelaniya, and pronounced his first vows as a Jesuit in 2007. He obtained a bachelor’s degree in Visual Communication from Loyola College, Chennai, and a master’s degree in Philosophy from Satya Nilayam, the Jesuit Faculty of Philosophy, in Chennai, India. In 2015, he was sent to London for theological studies at Heythrop College. He, together with seven other companions, was ordained deacon by His Lordship Nicholas Hudson, the Auxiliary Bishop of Westminister, on 25th February 2017 at St. Ignatius Church, Stamford Hill, London. He, together with me, was ordained presbyter by His Lordship Most Rev. Dr. Cletus Chandrasiri (O.S.B), the Bishop of Ratnapura, on 2^nd September 2017 at Saint Mary’s Church, Grand Street, Negombo. The very next day, he offered his first thanksgiving Mass at Our Lady of the Holy Rosary Church, Kudapaduwa, Negombo. Since then, he was the Assistant Parish Priest at St. Sebastian Church Madampe, Chilaw, where he also served as a Deacon. 

In fact, the last three days of Fr. Nilan Fernando on earth were quite different as they were very painful to his beloved parents, brother, sister, the Jesuits, and many others. In the crowd gathered at his funeral, there was indeed a marked peculiarity. Persons known to him as such were not many among those who came to pay him homage. Among those who did come were infants, children, youth, and the elderly. This reminded me of Jesus’ word: “Let the Children come to me” (Mt. 19: 14). If Fr. Nilan could draw such a huge crowd that tells us how big a heart he had.

As his companion in formation, I found in Fr. Nilan a true friend, a brother, a companion, and a priest so genuine and so spotless. Genuine, because he had no politically correct answers. He spoke his heart out and was never ashamed to accept things as they are. He was spotless because his heart was pure; quick in forgetting hurts and so full of laughter.

Like a child, he had a special love for children. I remember how he got little children to draw pictures (there were some left in his coffin, tokens of love for their beloved Punchi Swami. He equally loved wildlife, plants, and animals. When he had come to Hingurakgoda on 28^th June to preach the first day’s novena in view of the Annual feast of Corpus Christi, he taught me how a bonsai is made, a leisure time activity of his in the Parish. His favorite TV channels were National Geography and Animal Planet.  As a matter of fact, he had other hobbies like catching snakes to amuse himself. I remember once during our theology days when we met in France and while visiting a zoo how he took great pleasure in educating me about some rare animal species which I saw for the first time in my life. As an artist, he loved to make toy elephants and other favorite animals out of paper pulp to make gifts of them to his loved ones who now treasure them as precious souvenirs. In his room at Madampe, Fr. Nilan had a water tank, and in it were ‘companions’ he loved: a big fish, a tortoise, and a prawn.

The sudden departure of such a loving companion is too big a cross to bear. Nevertheless, God’s ways are mysterious, and may His will be done! Hence, with Job, our prayer will be: “The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21). We remember the promise: “In My Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and welcome you into My presence, so that you also may be where I am (John 14: 2-3). Don’t we always pluck the best flowers to offer them at the altar? If so, Fr. Nilan is a precious bud nipped before it fully bloomed. May Our Lord welcome our beloved brother, Nilan, to our heavenly abode with His words: “Well done, you good and faithful servant: you have been faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many things: enter into the joy of your lord(Mt. 25: 21)”. 

May God’s Faithful Servant Rest in Peace! 

 

His friend, brother, & companion,

Rev. Fr. Rashmi M. Fernando, S.J.

Parish Priest, 

Christ the King Church, 

Hingurakgoda

හිඟුරක්ගොඩ පල්ලියේ උපාසක තාත්තා

Fernando, R. (2018, February 25). Hingurakgoda palliye koi katath upakara kala Madduma Banda upasaka thaththa (Madduma Banda, the Buddhist worshiper at Hingurakgoda church, who helped everybody). Jnanartha Pradeepaya (Catholic Sinhalese News Paper), p. 14.

Christmas

A Time to Celebrate God’s Hospitality Toward Humankind

Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus, the Christ, about whom the Bible says ‘the king of peace’ (Is. 9:6). While it is a joyful occasion, Christmas is nonetheless not any ordinary celebration of a birth whatsoever. It is indeed the feast of the Nativity of the incarnated God, the God who visited humankind in its own backyard – the humanity. In fact, God was visiting humankind when they (Adam and Eve) first said ‘No’ to God. About 4000 years later, it was again during God’s visit to humankind that Mary said ‘Yes’ to God. During this period, God was visiting humanity in a number of means and forms in the Old Testament. In the New Testament, Christ was repeatedly found visiting men and women on their own shores – beaches, plains, tax collector’s desks, houses of reputed sinners, etc. Therefore, it is only in His hospitality that God could liberate humanity from the bondage of sin. 

Christmas, therefore, is the celebration of God’s great hospitality shown to humankind. It is indeed great because, according to Rahnerian thinking, if God were to become anybody else other than God, He only became and continues to become a human being (and not any other created species). Christmas is therefore the culminating point of the long contemplation that the perichoretic triune God had in order to participate voluntarily in the joys and sufferings of humankind. “The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us” (Jn 1:14).

Given this liberating hospitality of God, Christmas invites us to participate in such divine nature in the context of Sri Lanka today. Were we hospitable to our Sinhalese as well as Tamil brethren before, during, and after the war? If ‘yes’, then why was the need to take arms at all? Such hospitality is still a felt need in post-war rehabilitation camps; in prisons wherein live those whose trials were unjust or not tried at all; in youth who are wooed to destructive abuses; in nursing homes and hospitals wherein a person-in-need is often considered as a ‘case-to-gain’ rather than a ‘brother/sister-in-need’; in children’s homes and in homes for the aged where loneliness engulfs the warmth of hospitality found in the Bethlehem’s manger; in the affected masses of the recent climatic situations which are often a result of lack of discernment (both locally and globally) on our mother, the earth, who groans in pain; in the poor and the voiceless whose silence cries the loudest before God. Were we hospitable to those Myanmarians who sought refuge in Sri Lanka recently? How can we say that we are hospitable to those who labor in plantations when they are still not entitled to the rightful benefits enjoyed by any ordinary citizen or employee on the Island? As different cults and sects, how hospitable are we when we defend our own faiths in the efforts of reconciliation?

It should be highlighted that when God visited humanity in its flesh, the latter was in sin. It is god’s merciful hospitality that did not make human beings outsiders of His Kingdom. When encountering the woman alleged to have been caught in the very act of adultery (by men), Jesus did not make her an outsider of the Kingdom. He was rather hostile towards the wrongs committed (by the woman and the accusers) and hospitable towards the wrongdoers (the woman and the accusers). ““Woman, where are your accusers? Has no one condemned you?” “No one, Lord,” she answered. “Neither do I condemn you.” Jesus declared. “Now go and sin no more”” (Jn 8:10). Pope Francis refers to the Church as a field hospital after battle, the last resort of the wounded. Are we, the Church of Sri Lanka, hospitable to our own woundedness as well as to the wounded other? If so, then how can we consider a person as deserving to be deprived of the country’s citizenship just because of an act he committed or refused to commit, when (though totally deserving) God does not remove us from our sonship in His Kingdom even in the gravest act we commit or omit? Can we, the Church of Sri Lanka, be more hospitable and discerning towards wrongdoers in our words and deeds? 

Therefore, may this Christmas be a time to experience and share with one another, especially with those most in need, the divine hospitality shown to the entire humanity by God. Starting from the season of advent, it is also a time to feel sorry for the times in the past we have not been so hospitable towards our fellow brothers and sisters (both personally and collectively) as a country or as those belonging to different political and religious groups. Let’s also not forget to take some special efforts to rectify the moments of hostility shown to mother earth in the past. May we all be touched by the great hospitality that God wants us to live and let live in this Christmas and in the New Year 2018!      

 

Women's Day - Miséricordiae et Misère (Mercy & Misery)

Miséricordiae et Misère (Mercy & Misery)

Dear Friends,

Happy Women's Day to you! Let me add some beans into your soup.

     It is the human mechanism of the mind that, when given an occasion wherein one party is more at the receiving end than the other, it tends to accuse the mightier while having pity over the weaker. For example, in the case of marital abuse, it is often the man who is made the culprit while the woman is justified. Or in the case of abortion, the woman is always accused while the silent cry wins over sympathy always. Or in the case of rape, the muscle-makers are often condemned while the life-bearers are sympathized. Likewise, when it comes to moral issues concerning the Church and the larger society, the former is often accused to be conservative while the latter is being flared up as pro-liberalists. In this way, when it comes to the Church and women, Church is always given masculine treatment while Mary is hailed as an icon of the feminist movement.

    But the difference between the Church and the above-mentioned human tendency is that the Church refrains from such an exercise of dichotomizing power which fundamentally gives the green card to one party while the other is condemned. Instead, in that place, the Church is occupied with creating a more win-win situation such that none of the party is left abandoned and wherein prevails, to use the Augustinian term, only two inclusive possibilities: miséricordiae et misère (Jn 7, 53 – 8, 11). This way, the church is neither traditional nor progressive, but it tries to be more human in preaching the Incarnated Message of God who was bent on becoming one like us. The Church is therefore evangelic in its approach than falling prey to any categorical thinking or construction, I believe.

     Secondly, the term Ecclesia in Greek means the assembly from which derives the term Church. While priests make up only one element of the assembly, it includes the people of God (for where there is no people, there is no assembly), rites, rituals, customs, etc. In brief, assembly is the people of Alliance who are greater and larger than priests, the should-be-servants-of-Christ following the words of their master, “No servant is greater than his master” (Jn 15, 20). Hence while the Pope, Cardinals, Bishops, Priests, Religious, and all the clergy are not the Church in themselves. Mind you that this position is very different from the ‘Not All Men’ purification. It simply asserts the point that the ‘Whole is Greater than the Sum of its Parts’. In short, even if we say all priests, to make it all-inclusive as it is applicable to other denominations as well, they still make only one constitutive part of the Assembly.  

  

   Finally, it might be consoling to notice that, theologically speaking, the Church has always identified itself as ‘She’ and not ‘He’. And in the liberation theology of Asia, when speaking of the compassion of God, Aloysius Pieris, a Sri Lankan Jesuit, and a theologian speaks of the Incarnated Son as ‘She’ when he says: “Mercy is the sacrifice that pleases the Lord and makes us most like her” (A. PIERIS, “One of Francis’ Many Dreams for the Year of Mercy”, Vagdevi, N°19, January 2016, 5).     

     All that was said would sum up therefore to say that the Church, when faced with the incidents that wound her with cutting edges such as that which is being reported in Kerala on 6^th of March, 2017, is neither passive nor does she maintain silence. But she is reading and discerning her signs of the time at hand ever more fervently than before. Either in Asia or in Africa, either in Europe or in America, or in any seen or unseen corner of the world, she is trying to be more compassionate because she is becoming increasingly aware of her humanness and, in that, her rightlessness to judge. For, “there is only one lawgiver and he is the only judge and has the power to acquit or to sentence. Who are you to give a verdict on your neighbor?” (Jm 4, 12) It follows that all our mundane judgments, as a result, are according to the human-maid laws and, therefore, they lack compassion.

     Faced with such incidents as recently being reported, would it be said that the God of Christianity, the God of compassion, would give up His own essence – ‘compassionate’? No! God cannot but be compassionate. And it is in this steadfast compassion that God establishes His Justice which human justice is incapable of grasping. For, 

“The King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world…Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me’. Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels…Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me’. Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.” (Mt 25)

Happy Women's Day to All Who Recognize Their Animus Within! 

[Image: Courtesy Google]

« Donnez-leur vous-mêmes à manger »

Une méditation sur l'évangile et la première lecture d'aujourd'hui [Jr 28, 1-17 ; Mt 14, 13-21]

Mes sœurs et mes frères,

Selon Sigmund Freud, l’être humain a faim de sexe ; selon Éric Ericsson dit, l’être humain a faim d’amour ; mais Jésus dit,  « Donnez-leur vous-mêmes à manger »[1].

« Qu’avons-nous nous-même à donner ? »

J’étais étonné par cette remarque de Jésus,  « Donnez-leur vous-mêmes à manger ». C’est parce que, c’est une remarque apparemment stupide, apparemment paradoxale et apparemment illogique de la part de Jésus.  

C’est d’abord stupide, parce que ce n’est pas Jésus qui a pris le premier rôle. C’est plutôt les disciples qui s’approchent de Jésus premièrement, intervenant de la part de la foule, environ cinq mille personnes, sans compter les femmes et les enfants. Ce sont les disciples qui sentent en premier le besoin du moment, le besoin de la foule et leur propre incapacité à leur donner à manger eux même. C’est là que jésus leur dit : « Donnez-leur vous-mêmes à manger ».

C’est aussi paradoxale, parce que c’est Jésus, le maitre qui a appelé ses disciples en disant : « suis-moi »[2], ou encore « le Fils de l’homme n’a pas de lieu pour reposer sa tête »[3], lui qui est un prêcheur itinérant, il dit ici à ses disciples : « donnez-leur vous-mêmes à manger ».

C’est également illogique, comme au moment où jésus demande à la femme au puits, « Donne-moi à boire »[4] et en fait, au cours du discours c’est Jésus qui dit à la Samaritaine : « Quiconque boira de l’eau que je lui donnerai n’aura plus jamais soif ».[5]  C’est Jésus de nouveau qui demande ici à ses disciples, « Donnez-leur vous-mêmes à manger ».

C’est vrai qu’on peut expliquer ce passage de l’évangile soit comme un miracle de Jésus en tant que ‘multiplication du pain et des poissons’, soit comme un miracle de Jésus dans lequel il y a eu une multiplication de cœurs, de bonté, de volonté des gens qui, par conséquent, commençaient à partager avec les uns et les autres les petites choses, des petits gâteaux, des petits biscuits, des petit bonbons, qu’ils ont apporté avec eux.

Malgré toutes les différentes perspectives et différentes interprétations possibles, ce qui m’a beaucoup occupé est la question : N’est-il pas vrai que jésus est en train de tester ou mettre à l’épreuve ses disciples quand il dit, « Donnez-leur vous-mêmes à manger ».

C’est parce que la remarque de Jésus, « Donnez-leur vous-mêmes à manger » met ses disciples entre deux mondes : le monde de « l’avoir plus » et le monde de « l’être plus » ou du « devenir plus ». Autrement dit, le monde de la matérialité et le monde de la spiritualité.

Le moment où jésus leur dit, « Donnez-leur vous-mêmes à manger », les disciples répondent immédiatement : « Nous n’avons là que cinq pains et deux poissons ». Cette réponse des disciples indique leur concentration surtout sur les choses terrestres, leur préoccupation sur les choses de ce monde et sur les choses matérielles qui vont se détériorer et être détruites.

Face à ce Maître spirituel, Jésus, j’aurais aimé entendre de la part des disciples une réponse comme, « Maître, ne t’avons-nous pas suivi dans la pauvreté ? N’avons-nous pas laissé nos maisons, nos filets de pêche, nos terrains fertiles pour te servir ? Ainsi, comment ne voies-tu pas que nous sommes ici confiant dans la Providence, dans la paix et la liberté intérieure ? »

C’est exactement ce qu’on a entendu dans la première lecture, le débat entre Ananie, le faux prophète et Jérémie, le vrai prophète. Tandis que Ananie parle d’un joug de la vengeance parce qu’il a besoin d’avoir plus, Jérémie parle d’un joug de la paix parce qu’il a besoin d’être plus, de devenir plus, à la fois, personnellement et collectivement.    

Aujourd’hui nous sommes appelés à être disciples dans un monde de l’avoir plus, d’avoir plus de puissance, de richesse, d’honneur et, par conséquent, on se trouve dans un monde où l’humanité tue l’humanité, où l’humanité est en vengeance avec elle-même. C’est en ce moment, quand l’humanité est saignée par les forces barbares, que Jésus nous dit : « Donnez-leur vous-mêmes à manger ».

Après avoir parcouru dans la vie jusqu'à aujourd'hui, quelle est notre réponse à la question de Jésus « Donnez-leur vous-mêmes à manger ? »

« Qu’avons-nous nous-même à donner ? ».

Rashmi Fernando S.J.

---

[1] Mt 14, 16.

[2] Mt 4, 19 ; 8, 22 ; 9, 9 ; 19, 21 ; Mc 2, 14 ; 5, 27 ; Lc 9, 59 ; Jn 1, 43.

[3] Mt 8, 20.

[4] Jn 4, 7.

[4] Jn 4, 14.

“Awakening Water 2016”

Crawling slowly along the streets

But as brutal and horrific as you were

Is it just the fate you brought in?

Battered by you is a poor dad

Helpless you made an innocent mom

Orphan became that child who watched his/her dreams got soaked

Crushed under you was a ‘small family’

Yes, a ‘small family’…   

I silently keep looking at you

Not because I’m far distanced from you

Neither it's because I’m clueless of what to do 

Nor because I feel handicapped to do so…

I fight the tears with that battered dad  

I weep with that innocent mom who screams her heart out

I sob with that orphaned child who drinks unknown tears  

I lament with that ‘small family’ whose breath is the only survivor…

How great is that which you brought?

Why did you become so cruel?

What made you to be so unjust?

But, what you made to overflow was our own rivers of heart

What you broke opened was our own gates of reservoir of humanity

What got crushed under you was our own selfishness

And you recede while letting all that is destroyed buried under thick mud

Nevertheless, you will leave one thing saved for sure

That is our self-awakening to the human divinity within us…

Though you are not the first and the only one who created such an ever elevating human spirit

Yet you did it this time in an immense manner

Thus, I will not call you ‘flood’

Instead, I call you “Awakening Water 2016”…

“Awakening Water 2016”,

I wouldn’t say that what you did was just

Nevertheless, I cannot keep myself from saying ‘Thank you’ to you

Shall we wait for your next coming

Until we experience such an awakening of human divinity within us? 

When our rivers of heart, filled now with mercy,

Permanently shatter their gates of reservoir of humanity

And when there overflows divinity ever perpetually

I believe,

That you will never ever visit us again!